Marketers tend to pride themselves on three things: creativity, originality, and trendiness. They like shiny new objects, and they want to be first to market.

When generative AI was instantly thrust into the spotlight in November, 2022, it set off alarm bells. Creatives thought they were immune to automation; surely the “three things” could only be achieved by humans?

They suddenly felt vulnerable. What were marketers to do?

Early GenAI adoption

The first reaction was to embrace the new trend, dive in, and use the tech. It set off a wave of interest in other GenAI programmes in disciplines such as imagery, audio, and video.

Learning to come up with effective prompts became an early imperative. There was plenty of hand-wringing on the potential for job losses, leading to mantras about combining human ingenuity with technology for maximum effect.

The hype cycle peaked around mid-2024. The technology was improving by leaps and bounds. However, the market was flooded with too many GenAI products, the “fear factor” had settled down, and a key question was asked: Is GenAI a solution in search of a problem?

It’s the flip side of a typical launch point for entrepreneurs, who aim to ideate, produce, and sell solutions to common problems. Many of the popular tasks for which GenAI was often used were administrative in nature, or to supplement research, writing, or customer service (in the form of chatbots, for example).

Relying too heavily on the technology without the requisite safeguards had the potential to create problems rather than solve them.

There were cases such as these:

• A small-claims adjudicator in Canada ordered an airline to pay a grieving passenger who argued they were misled by the company’s chatbot into purchasing full-price tickets.
• One of the world’s top tech companies suspended use of an AI service after an automated alert incorrectly told some readers that Luigi Mangione, suspect in the fatal shooting of the UnitedHealthCare CEO, had shot himself. The story was attributed it to a news outlet.
• The CEO of a networking tool startup apologised after AI-generated e-mails to users commented on their LinkedIn profile photos, appearing to be written in the style of Donald Trump, with a marked contrast between messages sent to women and those targeted to men.

What we’re witnessing is a push and pull between the instincts to be creative, original, and trendy, and the importance of brand protection. The mistakes are cautionary tales. Trust is paramount.

Globe and Mail responds to GenAI

The Globe and Mail assembled an AI council in May 2023 to table legal and ethical issues, and to set up a process for teams to make resource and tool requests. Within a month, the newsroom published a memo on its initial guidelines for public transparency and to assist others developing their own approaches.

My instinct as a marketer was to push the boundaries. From the get go, I considered several ways to use GenAI to save time and money. I wanted to start testing the top platforms, and I wanted to post results in market sooner than later.

The first few years were a trying time. It seemed like I was caught up in a lot of talking and not enough acting.

I later came to realise the mantra “slow but steady wins the race” is a fitting phrase when it comes to using GenAI in a “live” environment.

No matter how many checks and balances you put into place, AI can “hallucinate” or produce made-up information. When you “feed the beasts” (add your original material to third-party GenAI platforms), you are training their models and could be subjecting your work to unknown uses.

GenAI outputs can contain copyrighted or trademarked elements. You also have to be mindful of potential bias and discriminatory outcomes.

Extensive testing is warranted, whether you’re building or licensing GenAI programmes. Humans should still be checking and recording relevancy and accuracy throughout the process. To achieve a level of full transparency, it’s good practice to use disclaimers any time AI plays a role in production.

I learned all this and more during the process of bringing The Globe’s Climate Exchange to market. Readers were offered the opportunity to pose questions about climate change, which the newsroom vetted and then assigned reporters to answer. Selected responses are now found with the help of a QA bot developed by The Globe that uses AI to match reader queries with the closest answer drafted.

The learning process

Throughout the last couple of years, we’ve learned a lot about GenAI and how to use it for our purposes. Here are some key takeaway for GenAI projects:

• Decide on the problem you are aiming to solve.
• Assemble a working group. Consider representatives from legal, information technology (IT), user experience (UX)/development, data, HR, marketing, and communications. Think of members as helpers not barriers.
• Conduct a thorough analysis of all related risks, knowing hallucinations likely cannot be eliminated.
• Give prominence to disclaimers.
• Use shared documents to set out guidelines for staff, including provisions for damage control.

Work completed or assisted by GenAI should only be public facing when your business is completely comfortable with the process and the expected outcomes.

I like the phrase “trust your instincts,” but when it comes to GenAI in the marketing space, “control your instincts” might be more appropriate.

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